Why fashion seems to be warming up to an older audience

It’s not what you think

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Lauren Hutton for Calvin Klein

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Lyn Slater for Mango

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Donatella Versace for Givenchy

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Julia Roberts for Givenchy

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Joan Didion for Céline

Fashion has always favoured the youth—almost everything you see on the runway is flattering to those under 40. From youth-defying serums to glorifying adolescence, the industry has received criticism for not addressing ageing in a healthy way, rather, offering solutions to fight it. Age has been inversely proportional to relevance—until now.

Older women started appearing in the conversations of current and critically received labels over two years ago. Joan Didion, an octogenarian American author, posed for Céline’s spring 2015 campaign, while Donatella Versace (61) and Julia Roberts (49) starred in Givenchy’s autumn/winter 2015 campaign. In an article titled “Fashion’s Two-Faced Relationship With Age”, Vanessa Friedman at The New York Times called out the polarity between image versus appeal: “Here’s the disconnect: On the one hand, fashion pays endless aesthetic homage to youth; on the other, it remains firmly in the thrall, and power, of the mature.”

When a brand that once put a 17-year-old Kate Moss in its most memorable campaigns now makes a statement by including 73-year-old Lauren Hutton in their most recent one, it’s not just the message it is sending out that has changed. A large fashion conglomerate like Calvin Klein is not one to create an advertising campaign without concrete research about its elements. The carefully calculated move on the part of the label, and others like it, comes from a market survey that reveals that fashion, despite popular culture and social media suggesting otherwise, is actually being consumed by an older audience. Wooing the new (older) age bracket is just makes sense for the business.

According to a report by Nielsen, Baby Boomers (people born roughly between 1946 and 1964, currently falling in the 53-to-71 age bracket) control 70 per cent of the disposable income in the United States, making them the most valued generation for marketing at the moment. And it doesn’t take rocket science to figure out that those without educational loans and mortgages to pay off are more likely to spend on luxury products than those with.

Conversations about inclusivity in the fashion industry will only broaden with this move. Are we going to see more women flaunting wrinkles and silver hair on billboards and runways in the future? The statistics point in the direction of fortune for those who are willing to adapt to the formerly sidelined market. As Anna Wintour, editor in chief, Vogue US, stated in a recent interview with BoF on the future of fashion business, “Change has to be what we breathe.”